Chris Piper - The Future of Bend

Chris is the General Manager at Technology Design Associates, here in Bend, which is a full services technology integration firm. In his current role and in his business career, Chris has excelled at developing and executing business strategies using strong business acumen, team building, decisive problem-solving and enduring partnerships built on trust.

Chris is currently serving as a Board of Director with three Bend non-profit associations which are The Council on Aging, The Downtown Bend Business Association, and Family Kitchen. When he served as City Councilor  he was on the Bend Economic Advisory Board (BEDAB), Bend MPO, Landmarks Commission, Downtown Bend Business Association, Chair of the City Stewardship Committee, he was an Alternate to the Central Oregon Cities Organization (COCO), and was liaison to the Old Bend Neighborhood Association and the SW Bend Neighborhood Association. What that says to me is that Chris knows Bend.

He’s running now to become the mayor of Bend. I thought it would be valuable for us all to hear his thoughts on the future of Bend and the issues that need strong leadership.

Transcript

Unknown: 0:08

Well, the neighborhood association is an area that I will truly focus on. I feel it's a forgotten group 13 associations currently forgotten. The neighborhood associations provide the community members the opportunity to help shape the future of their neighborhood in the city. And they maintain and improve the quality of life in the city. It helps increase citizen participation and local decision making and forms and effective partnership between the city and neighborhood residents. And as you noted, you know, there are 13 neighborhood associations that are recognized by the city council. And currently I do feel that they truly are being recognized. Welcome to

Narrator: 0:51

cascade views a discussion with Central Oregon leaders. Your host is Michael SIPE, local business and community leader Best Selling Author of the Avada principle and candidate for Oregon State Representative for House District 53, which encompasses southern Redmon sisters Tamil low and northern Ven. The purpose of these discussions is to share the views and insights of local leaders from a variety of community sectors on a range of timely and important regional and state issues. With that, now here is your host, Michael SIPE.

Michael Sipe: 1:25

My name is Michael SIPE, and I'll be your host. My guest today is Chris Piper. Chris is the general manager at technology design associates here in Ben, which is a full Services Technology Integration firm in his current role, and in his business career, Chris has excelled in developing and executing business strategies. Using strong business acumen, team building, decisive problem solving, and enduring partnerships built on trust. Chris is currently serving as a board of director with three then nonprofit associations, the Council on Aging, the downtown bend Business Association, and family kitchen. When he served as been city councilor, he was on the bend Economic Advisory Board, and MPO Landmarks Commission downtown bend Business Association, chair of the City Stewardship Committee, he was an alternate to the Central Oregon cities organization, and was liaison liaison to the old Ben Neighborhood Association, and the Southwest bend neighborhood association. So what that says to me is the nose men and never sleeps. I don't know how you do all that. But that's, that's incredible. In any event, Chris is running now to become the mayor of Ben. And I thought it would be valuable for us all to hear his thoughts on the future of Ben, and the issues that need strong leadership. So Chris, welcome to the show.

Unknown: 2:43

Thank you very much, Michael, it's a pleasure to be here and grateful for the for the medium that you provide here. So a residence of band can become better informed and educated about candidates that are running in the 2022. Election. i As you noted, in running for mayor of band, and so I appreciate this time and look forward to our conversation. You bet.

Michael Sipe: 3:09

I really want to focus on some key Ben city issues. But before we jump into those, I know I gave you just a little bit of a background. But how about giving us some more backstory on your professional career and some of the skills that you have that you're going to be able to apply as mayor?

Unknown: 3:26

Yeah, well, you did a nice job with your introduction kind of made me exhausted, to be honest with you. But I think a lot of what you said, are definitely the the quality of an individual that we need to lead our city. And with my background, as you pointed out, all those things have allowed me to understand the workings of our city. The relationships with city staff, relationship with our city manager, form relationships with current councillors. And the other part is being actively involved in the community. I think it's really important to know that after the last election, that instead of being able to continue on counsel, I found a way to continue to serve our community and you identify the three boards that I serve on and I felt it was really important to to serve on on those boards because I believe that those are core areas that continue to need focus and add more awareness which is you know, our aging population our small to medium sized businesses that that make up the the economy here in Bend, as well as individuals in our community that you know, need a good square meal which family kitchen provides. You know, it's we have families that choose to either go hungry to pay their electric bill and we don't wanting to go hungry wanting to have a place to, to go and have fellowship and be able to have a good warm, warm meal. And so family kitchen provides it and council on aging provides that through the meals and Wheels program. And I think a lot of that background and experience really puts me in touch gets me out of my, my bubble, if you will, and really becomes very engaged with the with the community band, and help us prepare and have that strategic foresight for for the continued growth that men will will see going forward.

Michael Sipe: 5:38

Well, thanks for all of that service and for the engagement, we certainly need it. Let's talk about city council for a minute. So you were on the city council. So tell us about that experience, maybe what you liked about it, and maybe what you found challenging?

Unknown: 5:54

Well, what I liked about it was the council itself, we had such a, we had a good counsel. And when I say good counsel, we we were able to have a lot, we all had different ideologies, different perspectives, which created good debate opportunities for us to challenge each other in a positive way, and come to a decision on policies that were before us that were, you know, best for the for the community overall. And I think that's an area that we need to continue. And what I hope the residents of bend will take into consideration in this upcoming election. That council needs to remain as a nonpartisan physician. And the council that we had in the past was it was a good county council because of its balance. The challenging part of it is there's never enough time. You know, it's a truly a volunteer position, if you will, and you get what you put into it just like you would as a business person in your job. But on council, it's you, you have an opportunity to put as much time into it, or just to put in the minimal time required for counsel. And that's challenging to find that balance because as a public servant. In that position, I saw myself really wanting to fulfill that role as a public servant, really wanted to be more engaged in the community get out in front of the Dyess. And it was hard, because you had a full time job. And you also were being in a council of the city. And there was many, many people that wanted to sit down with you. And I wanted to have those opportunities. And I did as many meetings as I possibly could, outside of my council assignments, which are the committees that you identified. And so I found those that to be challenging. I think the other challenging role that I learned was trying to get the communication out to the community, we really need to I really need to identify more mediums to get information out to our community so that they can be more engaged. And so Council can listen more, and bring that feedback and ideas from the community into a counselors decision making process to you know, make the right decision that that counselor feels best. By having information from from all sides of the community. I found that very challenging to be able to to get that done in a in a fair way for our residents to be involved.

Michael Sipe: 8:53

So you're probably asking yourself this on some mornings when you get up you you had a taste of Council. What would lead you to run for mayor and hop back into the fire? You know, we know it's a really challenging job. Why are you doing it to yourself again?

Unknown: 9:09

Well, maybe I'm like waiting for punishment. I don't know. But no, in all seriousness, you know, I've always had it in in me to, to volunteer and to and to serve and serving on the on the local level in the community. Is is an opportunity that I really cherish. And I'm seeing what happens when a council that comes in you know, this current Council, how quickly things can change. And I want to I want to run for mayor simply because the the leadership that's needed for a growing community the need for For more listening to our residents, and greater need of accountability, not only on the council, but also on our city staff, and greater community engagement between our city's elected officials, or staff or local agencies or neighborhood associations in the residents of band, it by doing that, it provides each of us the chance to truly listen and learn from one another and eventually unite our city, which I believe right now is is becoming divided. And that's why I want want to run for mayor is to bring our bring our counsel back to center and become more transparent and get our community more engaged in the in the process.

Michael Sipe: 10:47

Good for you. Okay, I got a handful of really tough questions. We got to, we got to crank through here in about 10 minutes. So okay, buckle up. All right, let's talk about the the first question I'd like to your perspectives on is been neighborhood associations, I think there's about 13 of them. Tell it tell us about the neighborhood associations and how you see the interaction between them and the council being of importance.

Unknown: 11:12

Well, the neighborhood association is an area that I will truly focus on, I feel it's a forgotten group 13 associations currently forgotten. The neighborhood associations provide the community members the opportunity to help shape the future of their neighborhood in the city. And they maintain and improve the quality of life in the city. It helps increase citizen participation and local decision making, and forms an effective partnership between the city and neighborhood residents. And as you noted, you know, there are 13 neighborhood associations that are recognized by the city council. And currently, I don't feel that they truly are being recognized based on the decisions that we're seeing being made. And I find that if we can give them the attention, be available, attend those meetings, make sure that they're being heard, bring that information back and incorporate what we've understood and listen to what their needs are into our policy decision making. It the city will become a more unified city by doing that.

Michael Sipe: 12:24

What a great idea. Listening what a concept, concept. bring innovation to the to the job, right? How about we just, you know, you alluded to this earlier, and everyone listening to this podcast, knows that the last four years have been extremely politically contentious, affecting all races from the President to city council, school board races. So what are your thoughts on shaking off the divisions and rebuilding some unity here in Bend, in addition to a couple of comments that you've made before?

Unknown: 12:57

Yeah, well, I believe that this election season 2022 election season, actually is a great benefit to every resident has the opportunity to vote, this is an opportunity for us to truly all of us truly focus and become more educated on our state or local and county elections. We don't have to worry about the presidential election right now that tends to overshadow you know, county and local and state elections, we can really, as you say, shake off that presidential election, because we don't have to really deal with it. And really get out there and talk about the things that matter for the future growth of our city and, and for our residents to become to become more united and more engaged.

Michael Sipe: 13:47

One of those things, that's a big issue on the minds of everybody in the region. That's homelessness. So give us your thoughts on the origins, the elements, the problem, the magnitude of it, how big is it and, and maybe a couple ideas on how we can come together as a community and address it.

Unknown: 14:05

Yeah, well, I appreciate you bringing this up, Michael. Back in November of 2020. I submitted a guest column to the band bulletin. And it was titled with empathy, determination and collaboration, we can tackle homelessness. And in that I state that one mistake that we make talking about homeless residents, we talked about as if they're one uniform group with the same challenges, the same pressures, the same needs. In fact, based on my former role has been city councilor where that experience comes in and being there. And the local associations that you noted in which I currently serve on our homeless are a collection of individuals. And there are ageing populations. Those living in poverty are hard to house and are addicted people with disabilities and domestic violence situations, as well. Students, and they all have unique needs and different circumstances. And they're all living across our band in our region. But what's happened is that we've grouped them into one bucket. And I feel that in order for us to what we should have done a long time ago, is basically utilized the ordinance ordinances that we already have in place. I know people don't like to use the word enforcement. But I believe that if we were able to use the right away policy, for example, that's that's part that is a policy that's already in place, we wouldn't see the festering and growth of homelessness on Second Street, which is impacting a lot of our businesses, I think we need to really invest in creating a By Name List of homeless in our community. My three point plan is, you know, a need of comprehensive review of our current approach, which involves the cities and disputes counties approach, we need to look at our approach to funding right now, the funding right now has been provided through ARPA funds. So it's not sustainable funding. So we have to understand what that what that looks like the city needs, needs to take it off of their roles and responsibility and begin to transition it to the county, the city is is not truly set up with resources and staff to focus on homeless. But we do have the ordinance in place to focus on public safety for our community, which is a key pillar of city council, and city staff. And then third is, as I just noted, that our communities must be safe communities. So we need to engage our agencies and our community leaders, leaders to really focus on that, that element of safety. We have residents and business owners that have been impacted a lot. And we need to make sure that that they're being heard that they're being represented in this issue as well.

Michael Sipe: 16:57

Chris, one of the other issues that has sort of been homogenized like you referred to in regard to homelessness, and it's one of my big issues. That's the challenges that we have with with housing. But specifically, I'd like to ask you a question about affordable workforce housing, not just overall affordable housing, but affordable workforce housing. So how do you see the the city can help with this?

Unknown: 17:21

Well, I think first, it's important to understand that, you know, workforce housing, you know, is really happening, in part is what we need it, because in part due to wages aren't just keeping up with increasing cost of living. But it's also due to the limited supply of the housing that's affordable to these workers that you identified, Michael, in opening this question. And so I feel that right now, we're experiencing here at my business, where we have a technician that has to travel in from Madras, because that workforce housing isn't available to him and his family. And so it creates, you know, longer commute times for the worker, higher levels of traffic and other negative externalities for our surrounding area. And there's a couple of strategies that I've identified with other communities that we might be able to, to think about, and I'd like to have our city staff consider and look into, and one is create a dedicated Housing Trust Fund, or repurpose vacant land and underutilized retail space. Perhaps even update land development codes to encourage development and already urbanized areas. We have the Ben central district, that was one area that I think really needs attention and awareness, which is a very key area when you look at the urban growth boundary for infill as a prime opportunity, shovel ready, where landowners are ready to focus on development of workforce housing, in that in that specific area. So it's, we just need to focus on it. And, again, I feel that, you know, this is an area for us to consider for for Ben to continue to thrive and have economic resiliency and strong economic development. We can't We can't lose our our direction on on workforce housing.

Michael Sipe: 19:28

We can't be the only committee community that's wrestling with this and again, we're talking about about good hard working people, teachers and nurses and, and policemen and firemen and, and employees just like you talk about in your business. Is anybody doing anything that's that's useful about this across the country that you've observed?

Unknown: 19:50

Yeah, there's actually a a panel that published a study and it's the Urban Land Institute too. And the ULI has offered recommendations and detailed implementation plan in a specific county in Florida, of all places. And I think it's an area that we can definitely look at. There's also models within Utah that we can look at as well. I mean, there's plenty across the country that we can, that we can utilize and actually go visit. But I think it's important to clarify, Michael, that this is just not to rest on the shoulders of the city. But this needs to be a shared governance model between the city and the Deschutes. County into chutes County, I also look at it as a as a Tri County opportunity as a project for Tri County to look at is this our county grows, we're all going to need to collaborate, we're all going to need to share resources, we're all going to need to work together. And I feel that's definitely an opportunity for a Workforce Housing Task Force to be created. And I'd love to see that move forward. And as mayor, that's a topic that I will continue to bring awareness to and put down is one of our is one of our goals. But we can't sit you cannot do it alone.

Michael Sipe: 21:19

Now I get it. Hey, in the last couple of minutes, I want to give you another hot question that will probably take about three hours to dig into. I get a lot of these students. But another another minor issue that's that everyone knows about. We have a huge shortage of safe and affordable childcare, in our city and in our region. Any thoughts about what the city can do to help with this?

Unknown: 21:46

Well, again, this is where the city, we really have to think about this is going forward partnerships. And, you know, I want to raise the example of the bench Chamber of Commerce. They are truly focused in this area have done an incredible amount of research are partnering with the city of Bend are partnering with the with the shoots County. And you know, just recently the HSUS county commission unanimously approved, you know, their largest American rescue plan at noon, as ARPA allocated an additional $6.6 million in relief funds to increase regional childcare. And, you know, the challenge is that it's just become a significant factor in our economy, into our workforce, and it's impacting our businesses and employees alike. And I believe that with childcare and with workforce housing, there are two key topics that need to be addressed. But again, I have to reiterate that it's not a city task that can be done alone. It has to be part of a shared governance model. I think one area that the city can do and when I was on council, is when we approved Master Plan communities that are being developed that that we identify childcare facilities within those master planned communities, for example, the petrosa development, the Stephens ranch development that is now under underway. Those are areas that we need to keep top of mind when a master plan community comes before Council is are we addressing an opportunity to have an area for for childcare facilities. But also funding is critical. And we're fortunate that we have the Deschutes County Commission that did approve, you know, some funding, which will help create more than 500 New childcare spots and train more than 275 new workers in the childcare and early education fields. So we're on the right path. We just need to continue to move forward and keep this top of mind.

Michael Sipe: 23:57

Thanks, Chris, as we wrap this up today, how can people find out more about your campaign and your policy ideas?

Unknown: 24:04

Well, they're more than happy to go to Piper for Ben calm. And on there. They'll learn a little bit more about me my background and priorities that I have set for my vision as mayor. And there's also contact information on there. I'm more than happy to sit down with one to one or one to many. Because that's that's my my goal. My goal is about listening, leadership and accountability as mayor event.

Michael Sipe: 24:34

Well Chris, it's been great having you on the show. I think my main takeaway out of our conversation today is that that need for collaboration, for coming together for for shared governance, and then partnerships to handle. So many of these really challenging problems that are bigger than any one governmental entity can handle by themselves but that affect everyone went in the region. And so thanks for that inclusive approach to this and that perspective. I really appreciate your time and appreciate your message today.

Unknown: 25:10

Well, Michael, thank you very much again for this opportunity. I really appreciate it. And I look forward to talking with those that had I had an opportunity to listen to this podcast.

Michael Sipe: 25:20

Terrific. My guest today has been Chris Piper. You can learn more about Chris and his campaign at hyper for ben.com. That's hyper for ben.com Thanks for tuning in.

Narrator: 25:34

Thanks for listening to cascade views with Michael SIPE. To find out more about Mike the upcoming election. The key issues he's focused on in his campaign to represent Central Oregon and Salem as a state representative. Visit www dot a voice for Central oregon.com that's www dot a voice for Central oregon.com You can get your own copy of Michael SIPE best selling book the Avada principle@amazon.com. And finally, please vote in the upcoming election. Your Voice Matters